There's supposedly some neurological studies out there about the origins of transness, but they're not very good:
Most of them have small sample sizes
They often involve brain parts that are not very well understood, and brain properties that are not very well understood
AFAIK neurology is just not that good of a field yet
Neurology should in principle be able to completely settle what causes transness. But what are the commonly proposed causes? Here's two theories that I've seen discussed a lot:
Feminine essence: Some sort of "identity essence" in the brain, such as a neurological body map, can be either male or female, and trans women are males who have been born with a female version of this essence.
Blanchardian: Among gynephilic trans women, the primary cause is autogynephilia, a sexual attraction to being a woman, whereas among androphilic trans women, the cause is unknown, probably similar to the feminine essence but more malleable than the feminine essence model would suggest.
Beyond these two, I also want to introduce three other theories that can be considered plausible:
Neither: Something else, e.g. massive polycausality, explains trans women, and the previously mentioned factors are either epiphenomena or only account for a small fraction of trans women.
Feminine autogynephilia: Similar to the feminine essence theory, there is a part of the brain that is feminized and causes a feminine gender identity. But the important part of the brain is specifically a part of one's sexuality, and the same aspect of sexuality that e.g. autogynephilic cis men have, so the theory doesn't entirely differ from the Blanchardian model either.
Just autogynephilia: Like in the Blanchardian model and unlike in the feminine autogynephilia model, autogynephilia is the major cause of transsexuality among gynephilic trans women. But unlike the Blanchardian model, it is also the major cause of transsexuality among androphilic trans women.
If a good neurological study is performed that proves one of these theories, then the market will resolve to the corresponding theory. If a very good genetic study or other study proves one of these theories, and people stop investigating it neurologically for some reason, then the market will resolve to the corresponding theory. If no theory gets proven then the market doesn't resolve. If it becomes unresolvable (e.g. all of humanity gets uploaded to computers through some means that doesn't preserve information about how transsexuality works) then the market resolves N/A.
If repression or social contagion (ROGD) plays a role, then repression or social contagion will not be counted, and we will instead consider the other factors residual for repression or social contagion.
I won't be trading in this market.
Update 2026-03-30 (PST) (AI summary of creator comment): If the results are bimodal:
If the bimodality aligns with sexual orientation, this fits the Blanchardian option
Otherwise, it may resolve Neither
If feminine essence or autogynephilia is a mode contributing >50%, that satisfies the "primary" criterion and can resolve to just that option
Update 2026-03-31 (PST) (AI summary of creator comment): - When the market can resolve to a more specific option (e.g. "Blanchardian") or a less specific option (e.g. "Just autogynephilia"), it will resolve to the more specific option
Most cis women being autogynephilic is a probably-necessary but not sufficient condition for resolving to "Feminine autogynephilia" — if autogynephilia is not an active contributing factor to transitioning, it will not count
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@Sinclair my personal felt experience of gender has gotten fucked since i
- lowered my estrogen to upregulate testosterone when i was in my work-out / longevity phase a few months ago
- started trying out woman-gendered labor (childcare, cooking) and finding it extremely difficult and unrewarding
@Sinclair On vitamin B methylation: Not sure what the details of his hypothesis is, but it looks like it's based on a few anecdotes, so if those anecdotes hold up (and I kind of doubt they will), it will probably apply too rarely to qualify for a resolution.
On woman-gendered labor: In my surveys, masculine/feminine vocational interests have been basically independent of affective gender identity in males.
@Elspeth Depends on which way it is bimodal. One possible way is that it aligns with sexual orientation, as described in the Blanchardian option. Otherwise it might resolve Neither. Though if feminine essence or autogynephilia is a mode contributing >50%, that would fit the "primary" criterion I've mentioned and can get it to resolve to just that option.
@tailcalled I find I'm still not able to predict how this market resolves given various outcomes. You said that a bimodal distribution divided along sexual orientation would resolve to blanchardian, yet you also said that if feminine essence or autogynephilia acounted for more than 50%, it would resolve to that option. Most approximately bimodal distributions have one cluster that accounts for more than 50%, and this market is resolve-to-one.
Moreover, I'm not able to predict which unimodal outcomes resolve to "feminine autogynephilia" and "just autogynephilia". Are either of these affected if it's revealed that most ciswomen are autogynephilic?
@Elspeth When the market can resolve to a more specific option (e.g. "Blanchardian") or a less specific option (e.g. "Just autogynephilia"), it will resolve to the more specific option.
Most cis women being autogynephilic seems like a probably-necessary but not sufficient requirement for resolving to "Feminine autogynephilia". If the autogynephilia is not an active contributing factor to transitioning, it won't count as "Feminine autogynephilia".
With increased censorship of transgender studies, it may no longer be possible to resolve this market objectively. I’m selling my stake.
https://www.medpagetoday.com/opinion/faustfiles/114043: CDC orders mass retraction of research over ‘Forbidden Terms’ about transgender people
Why would you expect there to be only one cause for people transitioning, or only two causes, or even only ten? Humans are neurodiverse enough that I expect plenty of unusual situations out there that don't fit into the :bug: main types of transness :bug: (insofar as those exist.)
How many exceptions do there have to be, for you to resolve to "Neither" rather than to the theory in question? 1%? 10%? 50%?
If it’s discovered that male and female brains are linearly separable under some representation, and that trans women happen to lie on the “women” side of the hyperplane, would that be sufficient to count as “feminine essence”?
What if a different hyperplane also exists that could separate AMAB and AFAB? (“trans women and cis men” on one side and and “cis women” on the other), would this resolve to “Neither” ?
(I personally believe that some feature space could allow for both hyperplanes, so idk how you would interpret such a result)
@KimberlyWilberLIgt For an example of this viewpoint, how do you feel about this study? https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34030966/ N= 803 trans people in MRIs, 69 citations since then. Findings were that all four cases of {cis,trans} {men, women} were separable.
What are criteria that you will use to determine study acceptability? Studies are of varying quality here.
If I think you’re likely to be sympathetic to a Blanchard study, I would need to trade Blanchardian hypotheses up for example, whether or not I believe the actual case to be. The market incentive doesn’t align with my actual position.
New study on a subject adjacent to autogynephilia: Elaborating and Testing Erotic Target Identity Inversion Theory in Three Paraphilic Samples
@Sinclair Depends on how it is caused by the physical environment.
If it's something that interferes with masculinization or causes some sort of feminization, then it will almost certainly resolve to feminine essence.
However otherwise (e.g. if the physical factor has nothing to do with sex hormones) it might resolve to some other theory.
@tailcalled I should note that it will only "almost certainly" resolve to feminine essence if the hormonally interference is the main factor, not if it is one out of many.
Like if there's a normally distributed continuum of biological femininity, and this is one of the contributors to transition, but trans women are only 1 within-sex standard deviation higher than cis men in this continuum, then the market will probably not resolve to feminine essence (but might likely resolve to neither), despite the fact that 1 standard deviation is big compared to the effect sizes you typically see in social science.
This is because if it was the sole cause of transition, we'd expect trans women to be like 2-4 standard deviations above average (depending on the estimated transition rate), and if it was a primary-but-not-sole-cause you'd still expect trans women to be pretty close to that.
Disclaimer: I may have some of the math wrong here because I'm just going off the top of my head. I'll make sure to post my reasoning for discussion and critique before resolving the market. Though once we know enough to resolve the market, I don't expect we'll need to apply this sort of argument bwcause we understand the mechanisms in more detail.